# Temperature v. Humidity



## capttrips (Jun 25, 2012)

After a lot of reading I've come to the conclusion the storing my cigars at +|- 65 rh is the right way to go. My problem is keeping the temp right. My humidors usually stay at 72-73 degrees. Is this going to create an issue? I have a good sum of money tied up in cigars right now and would hate to ruin them!! What is the best way to resolve this issue?


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## burritosdaily (Jul 2, 2007)

guys with more knowledge will reply here..... but my impression from reading other posts about this is that if you freeze what comes into your box then you don't need to be concerned with a slightly high temperature. If you do not freeze then you are at a higher likelihood of getting some beetle development.


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## TampaToker (Jun 27, 2012)

capttrips said:


> After a lot of reading I've come to the conclusion the storing my cigars at +|- 65 rh is the right way to go. My problem is keeping the temp right. My humidors usually stay at 72-73 degrees. Is this going to create an issue? I have a good sum of money tied up in cigars right now and would hate to ruin them!! What is the best way to resolve this issue?


My Humidors stay at 65-68% RH and around 73 degrees. Hard to get them much cooler in FL. I just keep them in a dark closet and hope for the best. I haven't had any problems...

Now this is just my opinion...but I think you should be fine under 75 degrees. Remember where these cigars come from and how hot it is there.

I'm sure someone with more experience will chime in.


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## Ants (May 30, 2012)

Hi Dave, 

Not an expert, but I'm glad to share my thoughts with you.

Matt has already touched on the potential cigar beetle problems that can arise with cigars that are stored above recommended temperatures. As he noted, freezing all of your cigars for 24-48 hours, as well as freezing any new cigars that enter your collection, should prevent any beetle outbreaks.

However, beetles aside, lets touch on the smokeability of your cigars, which is likely why you maintain an rH of 65%. Note that the humidity reading you reference is relative to the temperature of your cigars (rH = relative humidity). So, a cigar stored at 68 degrees with a rH of 65% may smoke differently than a cigar stored at 72 degrees with a rH of 65%.

There are lots of cost efficient solutions for maintaining rH, but unfortunately there aren't as many feasible options for maintaining temperature. The easiest solution would be to move your humidor to the coolest area of your dwelling, but this isn't always an option. I keep my humidor in my basement, which maintains a 68-69 degree temperature. I used to keep it on my main floor, but the temp was hitting 75 degrees there in the summer as my A/C couldn't keep up with mother nature. Many people on this forum use wineadors or coolidors, which give you more options for temp control.

With all that being said, personally I dont think 72 degrees and rH of 65% is a problem, I bet there are many BOTLs on Puff who have a similar environment.


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## loulax07 (Dec 17, 2011)

Perfectly fine. Mine are a bit warmer if they aren't in my Newair. You'll be ok. Most sites say 70/70 I prefer 63/70. You're at 73, close enough if you maintain a healthy rh.


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## Kindanutz (Jan 31, 2012)

All my gars stay at 59-62% and 65 to 70 degrees...


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## DrRus (Jun 5, 2012)

capttrips said:


> After a lot of reading I've come to the conclusion the storing my cigars at +|- 65 rh is the right way to go. My problem is keeping the temp right. My humidors usually stay at 72-73 degrees. Is this going to create an issue? I have a good sum of money tied up in cigars right now and would hate to ruin them!! What is the best way to resolve this issue?


The only issue I see is that it's very close to beetle hatching temperature. Tobacco beetle hatches generally at over 75F, but this doesn't mean that they will never hatch at a lower temperature, they could easily hatch at 73F.
The good news is that most cigar makers take measures to deal with the beetles. Keeping the cigars for a week between 33F-40F will kill all eggs, for example. Yet others use pesticides to deal with the tobacco beetle.
The bad news is that not all cigar makers do this - there are tons of stories online about Graycliff cigars hatching beetles when it gets warm, for example.

My humidors will reach 72-73F during summer and I am yet to see beetles, so you shouldn't worry too much.

But if you still want to lower your temperature (and don't want to keep your cigars in a wine cooler), you can always put one of those freeze-packs in a saucer in your humidor (if it's big enough), just make sure you swab it with alcohol first, as to avoid introducing mold to your humi. Another option is to keep it below the AC vent in the room, if available.


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## Quine (Nov 9, 2011)

DrRus said:


> The only issue I see is that it's very close to beetle hatching temperature. Tobacco beetle hatches generally at over 75F, but this doesn't mean that they will never hatch at a lower temperature, they could easily hatch at 73F.


They can hatch at 68F too, it just takes longer. The question doesn't have to be about beetles! If there are _no beetle eggs_ in your cigars (either because there weren't any to begin with or you have frozen them dead), then beetles will never hatch no matter what the temp and the only issue is "how high/low is too high/low for optimal storage of cigars?" In my environment, indoor summer temps drift around 70F and up to 80F on occasional hot days, while my indoor winter temps hover around 60F, and at night as low as 55F. So far my cigars have been fine throughout that range.


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## Milhouse (Oct 22, 2011)

With this hot weather, my basement has been creeping into the mid 70's.

I'm glad I did a big freeze job a while back.


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## The Counselor (Jun 19, 2012)

My humidor hovers around 74 to 76 degrees and my RH is a steady 66-65%. I'm still new at this so my knowledge base is still growing but my cigars seem to be doing well in that environment. Sometimes there isn't much we can do about the temperature unless you venture into coolidor or wineador territory. For me, I have spent a lot of money and resources buying a traditional Spanish cedar humidor that those are not an option as this point. On a side note I do freeze my sticks in hopes of avoiding a beetle infestation. Hope this helps. Regards.


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## DrRus (Jun 5, 2012)

Quine said:


> The question doesn't have to be about beetles! If there are _no beetle eggs_ in your cigars (either because there weren't any to begin with or you have frozen them dead), then beetles will never hatch no matter what the temp and the only issue is "how high/low is too high/low for optimal storage of cigars?


No, the issue here is _"My humidors usually stay at 72-73 degrees. Is this going to create an issue?"_ and the only issue with keeping cigars at 72-73F is beetles, nothing else.


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## Quine (Nov 9, 2011)

DrRus said:


> No, the issue here is _"My humidors usually stay at 72-73 degrees. Is this going to create an issue?"_ and the only issue with keeping cigars at 72-73F is beetles, nothing else.


But if you have live beetles then you have a problem no matter what your temperature, it just may take longer to manifest. OTOH, if you freeze your cigars, then you have no issue what-so-ever!


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## Flapjack23 (Jan 18, 2012)

I keep mine in a winador at 63F and 65RH...they smoke great and no issues so far.


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## Aschecte (Feb 7, 2012)

well the technical answer from a hvac guy is that it is called RH because the humidity is relative to the temperature and other atmospheric conditions. So what I am saying is that if for example your hydrometer reads 70% rh at 73 degrees but at 70 degrees that relative humidity becomes something like 68%. The reason for this is that colder air holds less humidity than warm air. Another real world example is that during summer months when it's hot out ppl complain about it being humid and muggy, conversly during winter your skin dries out and your humidor's rh plunges. This is all due to air's ability to hold moisture at different temperatures. There are charts online showing this comparison between temp/RH%. The ultimate test is to take note of what temp and rh% works best as you smoke them and try to keep that constant. Just stay below that beetle temp. Hope this helps.


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## asmartbull (Aug 16, 2009)

Try to follow the rule of 130.

65 degree/65 RH
70 degree/ 60 RH
60 degrees / 70 rh

KISS

It isn't rocket science, it is personal preference...
If you freeze your cigars, you need only worry about rh......


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## Quine (Nov 9, 2011)

Sorry Aaron, I have to quibble... You are speaking of absolute humidity, the amount of moisture in the air, and you are correct, cold air holds less than warm air. But relative humidity is a ratio of absolute-moisture/carrying-capacity. So if you have air at 70F and 70% rh, and you lower the temp of that air to say 65F _*without taking any water out*_ the relative humidity will go *up* to something like 85% in this case -- yes a 5deg difference in temp can make a big difference in air's carrying capacity.

The reason we feel soaked at 90deg and 80% humidity is because our bodies are responding to the actual amount of moisture in the air, the absolute humidity. If we walk into a place where the temp is 60F we will not feel nearly so muggy even if the Rh is still 80% for _that_ air because there is far less absolute water in the air even at 80% Rh at 60F than there is at 80% Rh and 90F.


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## Aschecte (Feb 7, 2012)

Quine said:


> Sorry Aaron, I have to quibble... You are speaking of absolute humidity, the amount of moisture in the air, and you are correct, cold air holds less than warm air. But relative humidity is a ratio of absolute-moisture/carrying-capacity. So if you have air at 70F and 70% rh, and you lower the temp of that air to say 65F _*without taking any water out*_ the relative humidity will go *up* to something like 85% in this case -- yes a 5deg difference in temp can make a big difference in air's carrying capacity.
> 
> The reason we feel soaked at 90deg and 80% humidity is because our bodies are responding to the actual amount of moisture in the air, the absolute humidity. If we walk into a place where the temp is 60F we will not feel nearly so muggy even if the Rh is still 80% for _that_ air because there is far less absolute water in the air even at 80% Rh at 60F than there is at 80% Rh and 90F.


I stand educated thank you for that detailed explanation. When I went to the locals education center to get my card I was probably asleep that day not to mention that was many years ago.We use sling psychrometers to measure humidity in the hvac world and I remember being taught the long.... very long difficult by hand method of figuring out rh and pressure / temperature but I'll be damned if I could do it now.


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## DrRus (Jun 5, 2012)

It's also important not to forget that water's ability to evaporate decreases with colder temperatures. So if you keep your cigars cold and humidify them with something like beads or packs, you would either have to use more of them on a larger surface, i.e. putting the beads in a container with larger surface or use something like Cigar Oasis to blow the vapors into the air.


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## zackly (Jun 27, 2008)

I have been maintaining my humidors for over 25 years. Since I've switched to beads (Heartfelt & kitty litter) it's become a fairly simple chore. I live near NYC. I monitor the RH with a digital meter. When it gets below 65 RH I soak the beads in water ( I now use tap water). It rarely gets too high but if it did I'd temporily add a large quantity of kitty litter which I have leftover. The temperature in the house, winter 69 & summer 76 using the heat & AC seems to work fine. I rarely have to do anything however. Having a large floor standing humidor with lots of cigars is more stable than a small box with a few sticks. Just remember, cigars may store better @ 70+ degrees RH but they smoke better @lower RH. I prefer 65-67% RH for smoking.


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## Quine (Nov 9, 2011)

Aschecte said:


> I stand educated thank you for that detailed explanation.


Thank you Aaron, so now I'll quibble with my own quibble... I qualified my statement when I said "...without taking any water out..." and this is true... But HVAC units do take water out of air as they cool it. That is, they act as de-humidifiers as well as air-coolers. I don't know if the de-humidification is the result of some explicit step, or if water condenses out of the air because the cooling brings the cooled-air-temp below the dew point. For example, if you take 90deg air at 80% humidity and chill it to 50deg, most of the water in that air will condense out because 50deg air has a much lower carrying capacity. That is, the Rh of that air would go way over 100% and the result is condensation. When that 50deg air is is mixed with room air to bring the temp say to 70deg, the resulting room air may well have a lower Rh than 80% because so much water has been removed from the chilled air...


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## Quine (Nov 9, 2011)

DrRus said:


> It's also important not to forget that water's ability to evaporate decreases with colder temperatures. So if you keep your cigars cold and humidify them with something like beads or packs, you would either have to use more of them on a larger surface, i.e. putting the beads in a container with larger surface or use something like Cigar Oasis to blow the vapors into the air.


But the same applies to the evaporation of water from the cigars, so I think it all balances out. You don't need to provide more evaporation surface area in the humidifier, because the cigars themselves evaporate more slowly in the cool conditions and so do not need as much water (absolute humidity) to keep them optimally humidified.


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## Michigan_Moose (Oct 11, 2011)

Kindanutz said:


> All my gars stay at 59-62% and 65 to 70 degrees...


YUP


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